Swiss miss: "Keep in touch."

I still have ten days to go here in Geneva, and four days left for my internship. October 31st is supposedly my official last day at work though, but as I still have a four-day leave more to my name (I have 2.5 days per month and earned all 7.5 total for 3 months), I took advantage of taking one off, that being on the 31st. I figured that this is the best time for me to go around the office district, have lunch with my former grade school classmate who now works at WHO, and then head to the ISO to buy that ISO document Ate Verna asked me to get for the Educ library (to be reimbursed, of course. Mahal e! Hehehe).

For this, the ILO Library threw out an early farewell drinks for me last night. From time to time, the library people hold occasional TGIF drinks, but since I won't be there anymore on Friday next week, and my supervisor will be away that entire week as well, they decided to do it one Friday in advance. This led some colleagues to believe that yesterday was my last day. In fact, three of them knocked on my door to bid me their goodbyes, give their congratulations and expressed their best wishes -- a gesture which I deeply appreciated. It was indeed a shame to say three times that no, I will still be going to work until Thursday. Good thing it just made them all smile! Hehehe. So on Thursday, I'm thinking of doing the office rounds myself :)

We were a relatively small group last night (most colleagues were on a holiday), but it was a wonderful, simple party. As usual, I had to make myself drink wine. I get really upset stomach whenever I take in liquor, but well, I risked it. It was a cocktail party and we had about eight bottles of wine on the table! I had one shot each of two different types of wine and man, by the time they started exchanging chit-chats in French, my head was floating and my tummy was churning embarrassingly.

Mid-way through the party, my supervisor gave an informal speech. She commended me for my work and after that, everyone raised their party cups for a toast. They gave me a going-away gift: a set of ILO souvenirs, which I really liked. One was a set of blank any day cards. "That's for you to keep in touch", they told me. "Expect to get the same cards from me, with my greetings, of course. Each of you will get one!", I said to them. We all laughed!

As the wine got the better of me, I needed to excuse myself sooner. I waved goodbye to everyone and before I left the room, my supervisor -- who I won't probably get to see anymore but hopefully do the day before I fly back home -- stressed, "Keep in touch, Christine." Words like those coming from a straight-forward Russian woman, who seldom gets personal, is something else to me. I firmly replied, "Yes, I will." And yes, I really will.